Reverse Cooperatively Routed Wi-Fi Direct in the Advent of 5G Driven Designs

In this article, the instantiation of the logic behind the so-called “Multi-Connect” mode of Wi-Fi Direct is advocated for and prescribed in order to make it possible to increase, if not multiply, the data throughput attainable by a given P2P Device thanks to traffic aggregation. In general, the described extension to the existing standard, defined by the Wi-Fi Peer-to-Peer (P2P) Technical Specification, enables the reversal of the logical roles of a P2P Group Owner (P2P GO) and its respective P2P Clients, while ensuring that the general architectural framework of Wi-Fi Direct should remain unchanged for backward compatibility reasons. This is achieved with the aid of a number of specifically tailored modifications including: new P2P Attribute allocation, extended Group Owner determination, modified P2P State Machine operation, enhanced Concurrent and Non-Concurrent operation, as well as expanded Reverse Operation Logic definition. The concept is illustrated with and verified through the analysis of cumulative virtual channel capacity and, therefore, the expected data throughput gain.